In this article, we will look at why you should make these changes and how you can make them. Once you have made the recommended changes, the end result will give you a better website and improve your users’ experiences! You will also avoid penalization from Google!

The following is an outline of the 5 website changes you need to make, and the sub-points included in this article:

Sure, I’m aptly naming my images and adding alt tags to them. I’m also adding a description. But I rarely caption them, and I keep forgetting to compress them before I upload them to my website.

I knew I needed to change this, especially the part about compressing them.

Why?

Images take up space on your server. They also can slow down your website loading speed.

This is why it is so important to compress your blog post images!

I then had a conversation on Facebook with Ashley Faulkes from MadLemmings. I’ve known this guy for years. In fact, we both began blogging around the same time. We met in a LinkedIn group called Bloggers Helping Bloggers. (When I first started blogging in 2013, I needed all the help I could get!)

I then asked Ashley for some advice, because I stopped compressing my images long ago. (I found a plugin that would do it for me, but this is the lazy blogger’s way of fixing things… and it’s not always the best solution.)

So… I realized I needed a solution to fix my images. I certainly didn’t want to have to re-do all of the images on my website. This would take for-e-v-e-r!

Ashley told me that I could optimize all the images on my website by performing a bulk optimize action using a WordPress plugin called EWWW Image Optimizer.

Back then, when I read that post, I was a fairly new blogger, I thought this extra step was a bit too much work to do… even though it’s not hard. So I did it for a few images, then stopped. I simply didn’t think it was a big deal to compress my images.

I know differently now.

So now I am going to make sure I both optimize AND compress my blog post images!

I will use Pixlr Express to do this. As I mentioned earlier, it’s not hard to do.

How to Use Pixlr Express to Compress Your Images (AKA the Tutorial I Promised You!)

Website Change #2: Increase Your Page Speed

Having a fast-loading website is beneficial for you because internet users now have a shorter attention span than a goldfish. Studies have shown that the average attention span has dropped from 12 seconds to 8 seconds.

How to Optimize Your Site and Make it Faster

I use Abivia Inc. to host my sites, and I am happy with them. They are a little more expensive than Bluehost or CanSpace, but I receive excellent support and service from them. (These are affiliate links, and if you purchase hosting from any of these companies, I will receive a small commission from them.)

You can search for a good host yourself… but I did a whole shitload of research on web hosts already. It took me weeks to put this hosting guide together!

Website Change #3: Add an SSL Certificate to Your Website

SSL stands for Secure Sockets Layer. What this does is provide an encrypted connection between your website server and your client’s web browser, allowing for private or sensitive identification information to be used safely and transmitted securely, without the risk of an attacker or hacker eavesdropping upon or tampering with the data being sent. (Such information can include social security numbers, credit card numbers, bank account numbers, etc.)

When you have an SSL certificate installed on your site, it will change your URL from http:// to https://.

And in the space where the URL shows up, a green lock will appear.

This is how you know if someone has an SSL on their site.

Why Do You Need an SSL?

1: You need an SSL to establish (or increase) customer trust.

Your customers need to trust you before they buy something from you. It doesn’t matter what you’re selling! If you don’t have their trust, you’re not going to make a sale.

Having an SSL certificate is particularly important if you are selling something on your website.

How and Why I Installed an SSL on Wording Well

I like making things easy for my clients, and so I installed PayPal buttons on my site to make paying me easier.

Because clients have the option of paying with their credit card, I wanted to prove to them that my site is trustworthy, that they won’t have any problem if they order using my PayPal buttons, and so I decided to install the SSL on Wording Well.

But I’m not techie… and so I had help doing this.

I did some of my own research and talked to my hosting company, too. At the time I wote this post, I ws using Abivia as my host. I know the owner, Alan Langford. I am friends with him on Facebook, too. He has always provided me with excellent service and he even helped me one-on-one with some technical things I could not do myself!

I also regularly get help from another Facebook friend, Shahid Khan. This guy is totally amazing, super-smart, really techie, and a life-saver when it comes to tech stuff. Shahid has fixed several of my tech issues, including 712 crawl errors I got after switching themes!

You can hire him through his website, PBN Magic. Or you can message him on Facebook.

5: If you are non-techie (like me), then I would recommend hiring someone to help you… like Shahid Khan. The guy is awesome!

6: If you are techie, you can use the BONUS section that is included in the PDF version of this blog post. Just click on the yellow box below to get it!

It was shared in a secret group on Facebook (which I am a part of, although I don’t know why, because I don’t understand all the tech talk that happens there!) and I was given permission to use it as a bonus to give to you! It was contributed by Nirmal Sarkar of HiTricks.

Website Change #5: Delete Pop-Ups to Avoid Penalization from Google

Every few months, Google updates their algorithms in an attempt to show others which websites are the best.

Let me give a brief history of Google before we get into why you need to delete your website pop-ups.

According to Google, “Google exists to provide the world’s best Internet search experience.” That’s why, back in 2000, Google launched its toolbar. Between 2000 and 2005, an influx of information was published on the internet, and people began blogging on their own sites. In 2005, Google introduced XML Sitemaps. In 2010, Google realized that a lot of webmasters were using black hat tricks to rank their sites, so Google decided to start penalizing them, and did so with their 2011 Panda algorithm update. This update hurt many webmasters by de-ranking their sites. (They deserved it!)

Your Webmaster Responsibilities

As a webmaster or blog owner, you have many responsibilities.

It is up to you to ensure the smooth operations of your site… from optimizing your images to increasing your page speed to increasing your customer trust by adding an SSL certificate to your site to using a responsive theme to eliminating pop-ups.

But if you do all of these things — and you do them well — then you will get more traffic, please your users, acquire loyal readers, increase your customer trust, make more sales, and avoid any kind of penalties from Google.

I offer a free e-book to my blog subscribers, along with other goodies free of charge in some of my emails… so pick up your copy of 20 Blog Post Must-Haves today!And don’t forget that I’m a a freelance blogger, writer, and editor for hire. (And an author who can help you create an e-book to give away on your site, sell, and even turn into a print book… to help you earn passive income.)

Lorraine Reguly, B.A./B.Ed., is an author and English teacher-turned-freelancer for hire. Her life journey is motivational and inspirational. Lorraine's book, From Nope to Hope, is a self-help book designed to help anyone who wishes to lead a happier life, and contains a built-in workbook. Lorraine offers 4 different services on Wording Well, including writing/blogging, and editing. She also helps others become published authors! Check out her services and see what she can do for YOU. You can also visit her author site, Laying It Out There. And don't forget to pick up your FREE copy of 20 Blog Post Must-Haves today!

84 thoughts on “5 Website Changes You Need to Make ASAP (+ a tutorial)”

Site speed is the most important thing while considering user experience as well as SEO. Images take a lost of time to load so its better to concentrate first on optimising images and then concentrating on other aspects.

Amazing post!! I am going to share this with our digital marketing trainees, and I am sure this is going to be very helpful for them to understand how to improve a website’s UX and technical things to get most out of it. I personally have one question. Do you really want to recommend those free SSL? Thanks for sharing.Samy Jan recently posted…YouTube Marketing Training India to Create YouTube Super Heroes – PromozSEO

This is an awesome article. You have researched well on this topic Lorraine! I have read this post a while ago, but forget to drop a comment. But this worth for a comment and share. I have already shared this article on my FB timeline.

The best in the list you said is “Adding SSL Certificate”. This step doesn’t only offer security on your website against hacker but also can offer a boost in ranking on google. You know SEO as well. . . that is a good thing too. Kudos to you.

Wow, Lorraine! Thx so much for the detailed post you have given us. I am definitely going to ask my webmaster about the image optimization plug-in, as like you, I have not been optimizing my photos before uploading them to WordPress and I’m not sure if that is slowing down my site. Thanks again, and happy holidays!

I blog, but I am not a website master by any stretch. I’ve been trying to work with a tech person on website issues such as you listed. So far the only thing we’ve accomplished is optimizing photos, which decreased the size of my site and sped it up a bit, but we’ve got a ways to go. Thanks for the reference points.

That page speed is a biggie. For me, it comes down to clarity. When you streamline your site, trim fat and make investments in your blog speed you will naturally create an awesome experience. For you. And for your readers. I deleted many thin posts, invested in a CDN, got my developer to build me a new, quick theme and also have him do all that image crunching stuff. My blog is legitimately fast now. On mobile. On laptops. Even in places where connection speeds aren’t too hot, my blog is cooking. What a difference.

Hey Lorraine, Wonderful post with excellent tips. I think some of the above given point are really indispensable to be implemented to make the website for reaching the great extent!! Thanks for revealing these success secrets of website!!?

Thanks for those tips and the reminder. I’d heard about them vaguely and then pushed them to the back of my mind 🙁

I’m delighted that those rotten pop-ups have to go. They drive me nuts!

Of course I don’t consider MY pop-up intrusive LOL Double standards maybe. Hope it’ll be OK – it just pops up in the bottom right hand corner every so often. (I wonder if frequency of appearance is a significant factor?)

Good to see you’re on SSL now. Have you noticed any significant impact to search engine traffic since the switch?

I’m going to have to switch sometime soon. The process of doing it now is far easier than it used to be – LetsEncrypt is a game changer. The only issue is the time it takes to re-index and re-asses our URL’s.

The ranking benefits are negligible for SSL from what I can see, but the trust factor is huge. And that’s only going to get more important when Chrome starts displaying unsecure site warnings in the future.

One quick note about the popovers:

The anti-popup update in January is targeting mobile popups only, so they can still be used without issues on desktop (at least for the time being).

Tools like Thrive Leads and OptinMonster have the option to stop popovers from being displayed on mobile entirely, while still displaying them on desktop.

That said – there are plenty of other ways to build an email. Sticky footer/header opt-in forms, content upgrades and all that sort of stuff will likely be used a lot more.

Awesome post Lorraine….!! You really rocked it… This is the guide which every blogger should read right now. Yeah I know you are the best. So I just wanna say thanks to you for such an amazing post. Gladly shared in my Blogging circle 🙂 <3

Hi Lorraine, thank you for this in-depth tutorial. Great to see that you followed up our Facebook discussion with such an important article. Now I don’t have any more excuses to optimize my images 😀 😀

I already have an SSL cert (using the magical LetsEncrypt service).

Regarding the popups, I’m pretty happy to read that google is penalizing full-page popups. They are so annoying. I know that we need to collect leads for our marketing, but being so aggressive is sometimes bad for the industry.

Jean-Christophe, I totally agree with you. I HATE pop-ups, especially when I’m looking something up on my phone. You can’t even close some of them. It’s so frustrating.

Recipe sites are the worst for these, too, I’ve noticed.

By the way, our Facebook discussion prompted me to write about this stuff. And what worked out really well is that I wanted to write about my SSL certification ever since it happened in October, but I was too ill to do it, so I included it here!

Thanks for commenting. I will be by your blog soon to reciprocate, because that’s what I do. 😉

Website speed is one of the most important factors. Whether you focus on the SEO or the user experience, page loading time should be less. Adding the SSL can be really effective. You won’t get any unwanted malware about even ranking can be improved. You have added the value in the content here.

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